6/8/08 - 800 Miles and Sunburnt

We are 800 miles deep. Staying away from the sun is fucking impossible. Scurry from shadow to shadow, quick. Our movements are slow, riddled with personal curses, yelps, and groans. We tried to eat the whole 12,000 miles at once and overate.

Two days drinking heavily in the hard San Diego sun shriveled us up. I saw one of my best friends from Flushing, who currently blows things up, drives fast boats, and screws beautiful women for the Navy. It feels right for him to be in San Diego, and he loves it. I was very happy those two days, playing in the Pacific, letting the waves crash over me, giving in and letting my body become an insignificant rag doll, slowly eaten away by the sun and the salty spray. The nights were warm, but not hot, and we did not shower, but did not feel dirty. Drinking out on the front porch, breathing in the sea less than a mile down the road. The liquor store is right on the corner, and it stays open late. Everything was perfect, and the laughs resonated into the soft palm-lined night.

But we had to pay somehow. Derek can hardly walk, and Lance is getting blisters on both shoulders. My back is a deep crimson, with the exception of two islands on my shoulder blades, and other distinct outlines where my hands could reach, and my skin remained pasty white, defined against the crimson. Like a clown face.

We are in Arroyo Grande, a high class wine country area in the middle of California, visiting Derek's aunt and nursing our skin. I feel spoiled. Everything and everyone is nice. The cars seem too nice to drive in and the food to nice to eat. I know it will be like that last piece of apple pie before Idaho before the hard work comes down like a sheet of rain, but I am a masochist and want to be hungry and dirty right now. The groups is bonding well but slowly, beginning to feel one another out. A few nights around a campfire, some dirt and a half empty stomach will get us together in a hurry. None of this thin mask of manners and hospitality. By the time we come out on the other end there won't be a mask, our faces will show enough hunger and appreciation themselves.

Tomorrow we leave for Los Padres National Forest, up Highway 1, then off to San Francisco and Yosemite. Our trunk is packed up tightly, precariously, with overflow spilling out into the back seat, falling out the back when the trunk is open. Once we crack into our food store we should eat ourselves some room. In the meantime I will enjoy my pie, let my skin heal, and relax. We'll be on our own soon enough, wishing there was some pie left.